Stage history of Gogol's comedy The Inspector General. Stage action. See what “Scene” is in other dictionaries

Open literature lesson on the topic: “Creative and stage history of the creation of N.V. Gogol’s comedy “The Inspector General.” 8th grade.

Lesson objectives:

 Repetition of known information about the life and work of N.V. Gogol

Acquaintance with the creative and stage history of the creation of comedy, development of students' perception of a literary work.

 Fostering love for the writer’s work, moral qualities of students, introduction to art and theater.

Design, equipment

 Computer, multimedia projector, presentation, excerpt from the play “The Inspector General,” excerpt from Leonid Parfenov’s film “Gogol Bird,” illustrations for the comedy.

Lesson type introductory

Lesson type mixed (a combination of different types of lessons - lecture lesson, film lesson, etc.)

Methods informational, partially search, illustrative and explanatory, visual teaching methods.

Preliminary homework individual messages.

During the classes.

1. Teacher's word

In previous lessons we studied the works of Pushkin and Lermontov. And today we will get acquainted with the work of another writer. I suggest you watch a fragment of the film and you yourself will try to determine the topic of our lesson.

(Video “Gogol “The Inspector General” beginning”)

Yes, you read that right. We will talk about N.V. Gogol and his famous comedy “The Inspector General”. This comedy left an indelible mark on the history of drama and theater. The work was written almost two centuries ago, but still does not leave the stage.(Slide 1)

2. The teacher’s story about some biographical data of N.V. Gogol.

Teacher. Nikolai Vasilyevich Gogol often called himself a traveler and considered the road his home. But still, there are several places on earth that were dear to him.

Gogol cannot be imagined without Vasilievka, without Dikanka, without Sorochinets, where he was born, without St. Petersburg, where he became a writer...

Let's take a journey through the pages of the life of the great writer, take a closer look at the living features of those places that remember him.(Slide 2)

N.V. Gogol was born in the town of Velikie Sorochintsy, Mirgorod district, Poltava province

Maria Ivanovna, Nikolai Vasilyevich’s mother, came here to save her child, because her two previous children were stillborn. The boy was unusually weak and thin, but survived. Fearing for his life, the doctor observed little Nikolai for 6 weeks, and two months later the mother and child went to their native Vasilyevka. The doctor said about the newborn: “He will be a glorious son!” He, of course, meant life and health, but it turned out that the words took on a different meaning, and the son of Maria Ivanovna and Vasily Afanasyevich became a glorious son of Russia.(Slide 3.4)

Gogol spent his childhood years on his parents' estate Vasilievka.(Slide 5)

The cultural center of the region was Kibintsy, the estate of D. P. Troshchinsky (1754-1829), a distant relative of the Gogols; Gogol's father acted as his secretary. In Kibintsy there was a large library, there was a home theater, for which Father Gogol wrote comedies, being also its actor and conductor.(Slide 6)

In May 1821 he entered the gymnasium of higher sciences in Nizhyn. Here he is engaged in painting, participates in performances - as a set designer and as an actor, and with particular success he plays comic roles.(Slide 7, 8)

After graduating from high school, Gogol dreams of public service, dreams of being a lawyer in order to eradicate the injustice that reigned all around. In 1828 he went to St. Petersburg. In St. Petersburg, Gogol tries to find a place for service, but to no avail. At the same time he begins to write. He tries himself in both the poetic and prose genres.(Slide 9, 10)

What works of Gogol do you know?

It was here, in St. Petersburg in 1835, that Gogol planned to write the famous comedy “The Inspector General.” This is a dramatic work.(Slide 11)

What is the purpose of a dramatic work? (Performance on the theater stage)

Why did Gogol decide to turn to the theater?

What facts from Gogol’s biography indicate his interest in the theater?

( Father, V.A. Gogol-Yanovsky, wrote comedies for the home theater of the wealthy nobleman Troitsky, in which Gogol played with his parents.

Gogol also performed on stage at the gymnasium in Nizhyn. On the small stage, lyceum students loved to perform comic and dramatic plays on holidays. They played both ready-made and independently written plays. Gogol and Prokopovich were the first authors and performers.)

Teacher. We have bibliographers working in our classes.. The guys received a proactive task: to find interesting information about Gogol’s attitude to the theater.

Bibliographer 1 So one day they composed a play about Little Russian life, in which Gogol undertook to play the silent role of a decrepit old Little Russian man. We learned the role and did several rehearsals. The evening of the performance arrived, to which many relatives of the lyceum students and strangers gathered. The play consisted of two acts; the first act went well, but Gogol did not appear in it, but should have appeared in the second. The public did not yet know Gogol. In the second act there is a Little Russian hut on stage. There is a bench near the hut; there is no one on stage.

Here comes a decrepit old man in a simple jacket, a sheepskin cap and greased boots. Leaning on a stick, he can barely move, grunting, giggling, coughing. Yes, finally he giggled and coughed with such a suffocating, hoarse old man’s cough, with an unexpected addition, that the entire audience roared and burst into uncontrollable laughter. And the old man calmly rose from the bench and trudged off the stage, making everyone laugh.

Bibliographer 2. From that evening on, the public recognized and became interested in Gogol as a wonderful comedian. Another time, Gogol tries to play the role of an old man - a miser. Gogol practiced in this role for more than a month, and his main task was to make his nose meet his chin. He sat for hours in front of the mirror and pressed his nose to his chin. Until, finally, I achieved what I wanted. He played the satirical role of the miser uncle excellently, filled the audience with laughter and gave them great pleasure. Everyone thought then that Gogol would go on stage, because he had enormous stage talent.

Teacher . What interesting stories from the life of N.V. Gogol!

Yes, everyone thought then that Gogol would be an actor. But he had a great desire to write for the stage.Besides,According to Gogol, theater had great educational value. This is a pulpit from which a living lesson is read to a whole crowd at once.He dreamed of comedy.

Comedy - one of the types of drama that depicts life situations and characters that cause laughter.

Look at the slide, there are 2 masks shown here,which of them can be classified as comedy, why? (laughs).

Why did Gogol decide to turn specifically to comedy?

(laughter helps to expose the vices of society (vulgarity, servility, servility, bribery, lies, adventurism, indifference to official duty), a person is most afraid of laughter).(Slide 12)

3. The creative history of the comedy “The Inspector General”. Fragment from Leonid Parfenov’s film “Bird - Gogol”.

What formed the basis for the creation of N.V. Gogol’s comedy?

4. Stage history of comedy.

Teacher. There is a plot, the comedy is ready in a surprisingly short time, it took Gogol two months to create the play. “The Inspector General” was accepted for production at the Alexandrinsky Theater in St. Petersburg.

Biographer 3. Gogol began to work closely as a director. Before the start of rehearsals, Gogol himself read the text to the actors, took care of the costumes, the scenery, and the manner of acting. His comments are precise, his requirements are definite. Gogol does not want the comedy to look like a cheerful trifle. Not to entertain the audience, but to disturb it with caustic and sharp laughter, revealing the absurdities and ugliness of reality - this is Gogol’s goal.(Slide 13)

The premiere was scheduled for April 19, 1836. Gogol was very worried. Fans of theater news gathered at the posters and box office. “St. Petersburg is a great lover of theatre. If you are walking along Nevsky Prospekt on a fresh frosty morning... go into the vestibule of the Alexandrinsky Theater at this time: you will be amazed at the persistent patience with which the assembled people besiege the ticket distributor,” wrote Gogol.

And finally, the first performance. The magnificent hall of the best theater in St. Petersburg is full. The boxes and the first rows of the stalls shine with the stars of dignitaries and the jewels of ladies. In the royal box is Nicholas 1 with his heir, the future Alexander 2. Representatives of the democratic circle are crowded in the gallery. There are many of Gogol’s acquaintances in the theater: Zhukovsky, Krylov, Glinka.(Slide 14)

Annenkov spoke about the first performance: “After the first act, bewilderment was written on all faces, as if no one knew how to think about the picture that had just been presented. This bewilderment increased with each act. There was almost no applause, but intense attention, convulsive intense following of all shades of light, and sometimes dead silence showed that what was happening on stage terribly captured the hearts of the audience.

The king laughed and applauded a lot at the performance, wanting to emphasize that the comedy was harmless and should not be taken seriously. He understood perfectly well that his anger would be another confirmation of the veracity of Gogol’s satire. Leaving the box, NikolaiIsaid: “Well, a play! Everyone got it, and I got it more than everyone else!”

5. Parade of characters.

Teacher: Let's go to the premiere of Gogol's comedy "The Inspector General." The theater begins with a poster. On the slide we see a poster for the first performance of “The Inspector General” at the Alexandrinsky Theater.It's time to meet the characters of the comedy.

Attention: “parade” of heroes. (Slide 15-22)

(on the slides are photographs of famous actors in roles from “The Inspector General” or drawings from the anthology). Textbook p.19-21

“The mayor is Anton Antonovich Skvoznik-Dmukhonovsky. Already aged in the service and a very intelligent man in his own way. Although he is a bribe-taker, he behaves very respectably; quite serious; a few are even resonant; speaks neither loudly nor quietly, neither more nor less. His every word is significant. His facial features are coarse and hard, like those of anyone who began hard service from the lower ranks. The transition from fear to joy, from baseness to arrogance is quite rapid, as in a person with crudely developed inclinations of the soul. He is dressed, as usual, in his uniform with buttonholes and boots with spurs. His hair is cropped and streaked with gray.”

“Anna Andreevna, his wife, a provincial coquette, not yet quite old, brought up half on novels and albums, half on the chores in her pantry and maid's room. Very curious andat case shows vanity. Sometimes she takes power over her husband only because he is unable to answer her; but this power extends only to trifles and consists of reprimands and ridicule. She changes into different dresses four times throughout the play.”Marya Antonovna - daughter of Anton Antonovich Skvoznik-Dmukhanovsky (Gorodnichey)

« Khlestakov, a young man of about twenty-three, thin and thin; somewhat stupid and, as they say, without a king in his head - one of those people who in the offices are called empty. He speaks and acts without any consideration. He is unable to stop constant attention on any thought. His speech is abrupt, and words fly out of his mouth completely unexpectedly. Dressed in fashion."

« Osip, servant , such as servants who are several years old usually are. He speaks seriously, looks a little down, reasonerAnd loves to read moral lectures to himself for his master. His voice is always almost even, and in conversation with the master it takes on a stern, abrupt and even somewhat rude expression. He is smarter than his master and therefore guesses more quickly, but he does not like to talk much and is silently a rogue. His costume is a gray or blue shabby frock coat.”

« Bobchinsky And Dobchinsky, both are short, short, very curious; extremely similar to each other; both with small bellies; both speak quicklyAnd Gestures and hands help a lot. Dobchinsky is a little taller and more serious than Bobchinsky, but Bobchinsky is more cheeky and lively than Dobchinsky.”

« Lyapkin-Tyapkin, judge, a man who has read five or six books and is therefore somewhat free-thinking. The hunter is big on guesses, and therefore he gives weight to every word. There is always a significant expression on the face. He speaks in a deep bass voice with an elongated drawl, a wheeze and a gulp - like an ancient clock that first hisses and then strikes.”

« Strawberry, trustee of charitable institutions , a very fat, clumsy and clumsy man, but for all that a sly and a rogue. Very helpful and fussy."

Teacher:

These are our main characters in the comedy “The Inspector General”.

Exercise:

 Flip through the play “The Inspector General”, determine how many acts (actions) there are in it and how many phenomena each act consists of? (5 actions, each from 6 to 16 phenomena)

 How many characters? Who didn't we name? (25 specific actions. Persons of different ranks and positions, many guests, merchantsAlready reading the posters makes it possible to assume that the comedy shows a broad picture of life, the peculiar anatomy of a county town: here is the head of the administration - the mayor, and officials: the superintendent of schools, the judge, the trustee of charitable institutions, the chief of police; district doctor, police officers, city landowners and city ladies, and merchants, and townspeople, and servants.)

After the production of “The Inspector General” on stage, Gogol is full of gloomy thoughts. He was not entirely satisfied with the acting. He is depressed by the general misunderstanding. In these circumstances it is difficult for him to write, it is difficult for him to live. He decides to go abroad, to Italy. Reporting this to Pogodin, he writes with pain: “A modern writer, a comic writer, a writer of morals must be further away from his homeland. The prophet has no glory in his homeland.” But as soon as he leaves the borders of his homeland, the thought of her, the great love for her with new strength and poignancy arises in him: “Now there is a foreign land in front of me, a foreign land around me, but in my heart is Rus', not nasty Rus', but only beautiful Rus' "

Why do you think Gogol was full of dark thoughts? (Gogol was not understood by the public, dissatisfied with the production of the play: “I was angry with the audience for not understanding me, and with myself, who was to blame for not understanding me.” The comedy did not fit into the framework of ordinary vaudeville, so Gogol from the actors demanded naturalness and verisimilitude on stage)

Laughter is the only “honest, noble face in comedy” (if we have time)

Teacher: Today N.V. Gogol is one of the most popular writers. His work is in third place in the world after the Bible and the works of F. M. Dostoevsky. First of all, he is known to the general public as the author of the comedy "The Inspector General." It has been staged on the stage of various theaters hundreds of times. And today, if we look at the posters of various theaters around the country and the world, we will certainly see “The Inspector General”. This is one of the most successful and popular performances today.

What is the secret of her immortality? Why are the problems raised by the author still relevant today? Will we not recognize the heroes of today's century among the characters? What does the great satirist teach us? We will have to answer these and other questions in the course of studying comedy.

6. Announcement of homework. (Slide 23)

1. Prepare a message: “Image of the Mayor”, “Image of Khlestakov” (according to the table).

Table “Image Characteristics”

Appearance

Character

Speech

Actions

Scene

Auditorium, loggias and stage (in the center)

see also

• Turntable (theater)
• Rotary ring

Links

Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.

See what “Scene” is in other dictionaries:

scene- y, w. lat. scene German Szene, floor scene gr. skene tent, tent. 1. A special area where the performance takes place. BAS 1. Onegin With men on all sides He swore, then looked at the stage in great absent-mindedness, Turned away and... ... Historical Dictionary of Gallicisms of the Russian Language

SCENE, scenes, women. (Latin scena from Greek skene, lit. tent). 1. The place where the theatrical performance takes place. Stage equipment. The stage is separated from the auditorium by a curtain. || only units, transfer Theater, theatrical activities. Half a century for... ... Ushakov's Explanatory Dictionary

- (lat. scene). 1) an elevated place in a theater where a play is presented. 2) the same as a phenomenon, part of an act in an opera or other dramatic act. representation. 3) an incident in reality or its depiction in a picture. Dictionary of foreign... ... Dictionary of foreign words of the Russian language

See case, theater to make a stage... Dictionary of Russian synonyms and similar expressions. under. ed. N. Abramova, M.: Russian Dictionaries, 1999. scene, case, theater; stage area, sketch, pageant, stage, picture, explanation, spectacle,... ... Synonym dictionary

- (foreign) theater. Wed. He has a phenomenal voice... he also has an appearance suitable for the stage... It seems, what more?... Make a mistake and a ship will come out; took it, put on the suit, and act at least in the “Prophet.” P. Boborykin. On the damage... ... Michelson's Large Explanatory and Phraseological Dictionary (original spelling)

Female, French a phenomenon, an incident in persons, or its depiction in a picture; | part of a dramatic performance, exit, appearance; | a place where something happens, a field, with all the surroundings, esp. platform in the theater. Appear on stage, exit,... ... Dahl's Explanatory Dictionary

- (Latin scaena, from Greek skene), 1) a platform on which a performance takes place (theatrical, pop, concert, etc.). The oldest type of European stage is the ancient Greek orchestra. Type of theatrical stage area, close... ... Modern encyclopedia

- (Latin scaena from Greek skene), 1) the platform on which the performance takes place (theatrical, pop, concert, etc.). 2) In a play, performance, part of the action, act. 3) In a broad sense, the same as theater … Big Encyclopedic Dictionary

SCENE, s, women. 1. A special platform where the performance takes place (in 3 numbers). Rotating s. Stage lighting. 2. transfer Theater, theatrical activities. Stage personality. A life dedicated to the stage. Leave the stage (also translated: leave the field... ... Ozhegov's Explanatory Dictionary

See: Act Appetite V.V. Vinogradov. History of words, 2010 ... History of words

scene- SCENE1, picture, obsolete. phenomenon SCENE2, platform, stage, stage... Dictionary-thesaurus of synonyms of Russian speech

Books

• Scene, Doroshevich V.M.. “In our new project you will find both books from the “golden fund” of classical Russian literature and rare, almost forgotten, works of authors who remained in the shadow of their greats...

The “Inspector” was sent to the III Department on February 27, 1836 for permission to submit. On March 2, a resolution was received: “Approved for presentation.” Censor Oldekop seemed not to have read the comedy. He hastily wrote: “The play does not contain anything reprehensible.” “The Inspector General” was approved for publication on March 13, and on April 19, 1836 it was shown in St. Petersburg at the Alexandrinsky Theater, and on May 23, 1836 in Moscow at the Maly Theater. The mayor was played in St. Petersburg by I.I. Sosnitsky, in Moscow - M.S. Shchepkin. Gogol was dissatisfied with the St. Petersburg production.

In the article “A warning for those who would like to play The Inspector General properly,” the author gave the following instructions to the actors: “The thing to be most careful about is not to fall into caricature. There should be nothing exaggerated or trivial even in the last roles. On the contrary, it is necessary The actor should especially try to be more modest, simpler and, as it were, nobler than how the person who appears in reality is. The less the actor thinks about making people laugh and being funny, the more funny the role he has taken will be revealed.

"Inspector". Poster for the first performance of the play in St. Petersburg. 1836

The funny will reveal itself by itself precisely in the seriousness with which each of the persons depicted in the comedy is busy with his work. They are all busily, fussily, even passionately busy with their work, as if it were the most important task of their lives. The viewer can only see from the outside the trifle of their worries. But they themselves do not joke at all and certainly do not think that anyone is laughing at them. An intelligent actor, before grasping the small quirks and minor features of the external face of the person assigned to him, must try to capture the universal human expression of the role. Must consider why this role is recognized; must consider the main and primary concern of each person, on which his life is spent, which constitutes a constant subject of thoughts, an eternal nail sitting in the head. Having caught this main concern of the person he has taken, the actor must be filled with it himself in such a force that the thoughts and aspirations of the person he has taken are assimilated to him and remain in his head inseparably during the entire performance of the play. He doesn't have to worry much about private scenes and little things. They will come out on their own successfully and deftly, if only he does not for a moment throw out of his head this nail that has lodged itself in the head of his hero. All these particulars and various small accessories, which even such an actor can so happily use, who knows how to tease and capture gait and movement, but not create the entire role, are nothing more than paints that need to be applied already when the drawing is composed and done right. They are the dress and body of the role, not its soul. So, first of all, it is this role’s soul that should be captured, and not its dress.”

Portrait of N.V. Gogol at the rehearsal of the play “The Inspector General” at the Alexandrinsky Theater. Drawing by P.A. Karatygina. 1836

Gogol's comedy caused the most controversial assessments in society. Many laughed, seeing The Inspector General as nothing more than a funny farce. Among those laughing was Emperor Nicholas I, who exclaimed: “Well, a play! Everyone got it, and I got it more than anyone else.” Most of the officials present at the performances guessed the serious, revealing meaning of the comedy. “Comedy was recognized by many as a liberal statement,” wrote Prince P.A. Vyazemsky, - like, for example, Beaumarchais’s comedy “The Barber of Seville”, is recognized as some kind of political brand, thrown into society under the guise of comedy... Some welcomed it, rejoiced at it as a bold, albeit covered up, attack on the powers that be. According in their opinion, Gogol, having chosen his provincial town as a battlefield, aimed higher... From this point of view, others, of course, looked at comedy as an assassination attempt on the state: they were excited by it, frightened, and in the unfortunate or happy comedian they saw almost a dangerous rebel ". " Gogol wrote to M. S. Shchepkin on April 29, 1836: “The effect produced by it [the comedy] was great and noisy. Elderly and respectable officials shout that nothing is sacred to me when I dared to talk like that about serving people. The police are against me, the merchants are against me, the writers are against me. They scold me and go to the play; they can’t get tickets for the fourth performance.<...>If it were not for the high intercession of the Sovereign, my play would never have been on stage, and there were already people trying to ban it. Now I see what it means to be a comic writer."

The truth said by Gogol rose to a high generalization. The bureaucratic tribe could not forgive Gogol for this. They began to accuse him of crushing the foundations of society - after all, the characters in the comedy and thousands of their prototypes considered themselves to be the founders of the foundations. “To say about a rogue that he is a rogue is considered in our country to undermine the state machine; to say just one living and true line means, in translation, to disgrace the entire class and arm others or his subordinates against it,” Gogol noted with pain. He very accurately formulated his thought about the situation of the satirical writer in Russia: “It’s sad when you see what a pitiful state our writer is in. Everything is against him, and there is no equivalent side for him. “He’s a firebrand!” He is a rebel!" And who is speaking? These are people of state speaking, people who have earned a reputation, experienced people who should have some intelligence to understand the matter in its true form, people who are considered educated and whose world, at least Russian the world, calls them educated. They brought rogues onto the stage, and everyone is in bitterness, why bring rogues onto the stage.”

Questions and tasks

1. Read the textbook articles and other materials available to you about the comedy “The Inspector General.” Prepare a report on the creative and stage history of comedy.
2. Why was Gogol's comedy received sharply negatively by the bureaucratic world and all adherents of class orders? What justification does the writer himself give for this?

Living word

Watch one of the modern theatrical productions of the play and write a review of it.

What is the stage history of N. V. Gogol’s comedy “The Inspector General”? How was it received by the public and critics?

Answer

N.V. Gogol wrote the play in just two months.

The first performance of The Inspector General took place in St. Petersburg on the stage of the Alexandrinsky Theater on April 19, 1836; the king himself and his heir were on it. On May 25, 1836, “The Inspector General” was staged in Moscow on the stage of the Maly Theater. The author continued to refine the play for several years, and the final text was ready in 1842.

The public and critics of the comedy N.V. Gogol's "The Inspector General" was received in different ways. Reactionary criticism, with the support of the ruling classes, began to persecute the play, calling it in print a stupid farce that was unworthy of art and had nothing to do with reality. The general public and democratic criticism (V.V. Stasov, V.G. Belinsky), on the contrary, greeted the play enthusiastically.

N.V. Gogol perfectly understood that the success of a stage work depends not only on the text, but also on the performance of the actors, and often personally explained to the acting troupe how to play certain characters, even wrote “Notes for Gentlemen Actors.”

Vorobyova Vlada, Mikhalkina Vasilisa

N.V. Gogol is a writer who wants to tell the truth about the time in which he lives. Despite the fact that 182 years have passed from the first production of the comedy “The Government Inspector” in 1836 to today, this performance is staged on the stages of the best theaters in the world. Problems raised by N.V. Gogol, are modern and relevant for almost two centuries.

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municipal educational institution

"Secondary school of the village of Uralsky"

Sverdlovsk region

Literature Research Paper

Performer: Vorobyova V.,

Mikhalkina V.,

8th grade students

Head: Salnikova M.V.,

teacher of Russian language and literature

Uralsky village

2018

1. Introduction…………………………………………………………..... 3
2. Main part. The stage fate of N.V.’s comedy Gogol

“Inspector” ..................................................... .............................................. 5

1. Creative history of the play “The Inspector General” …………………………... 5
2. The role of Pushkin in Gogol’s creation of the comedy “The Inspector General”………. 5
3. Productions of the play “The Inspector General” in the 19th century.……………………….. 6
4. Productions of the play “The Inspector General” in the 20th and 21st centuries……………………8

III. Conclusion. ………………………………………………………… 12

Sources and literature…………………………………………………………… 14

Appendix……………………………………………………………... 15

I. Introduction.

N.V. Gogol conceived the idea of ​​writing the comedy “The Inspector General” in the 1830s. Then he was working on the poem “Dead Souls”, and he had the idea of ​​​​displaying the funny features of Russian reality in a comedy.

Gogol worked on the play for only two months - October and November 1835. He presented it for production. And then he improved it for 35 years.

“In The Inspector General, I decided to collect in one pile everything bad in Russia that I knew then, all the injustices that are being done in those places and in those cases where justice is most required from a person, and at one time laugh at everything.” - this is how Gogol spoke about his play. So, the comedy was written, but the main thing that worried Gogol was how it would be presented on stage, what the viewer’s reaction to the play would be, whether the audience would understand the author’s intention.

Relevance of this research workis that N.V. Gogol belongs to the type of people who want to tell the truth about the time in which he lives. And despite the fact that 182 years have passed from the first production of the comedy “The Inspector General” in 1836 to today, this performance is staged on the stages of the best theaters in the world. Problems raised by N.V. Gogol, are modern and relevant for almost two centuries.

Purpose of the research work:

Explore the stage fate of N.V.’s comedy. Gogol "The Inspector General".

Research objectives:

Find out the creative history of the play “The Inspector General”;

Research role of A.S. Pushkin in Gogol’s creation of the comedy “The Inspector General”;

Collect information about stage productions of the comedy “The Inspector General” from the 19th century to the 21st century;

- analyze featuresstage productions of the comedy “The Inspector General” from the 19th century to the 21st century.

Practical significance of this studyis the ability to use it in literature lessons devoted to the study of N.V.’s comedy. Gogol’s “The Inspector General” A presentation prepared for presenting a research paper can also be used in literature lessons.

II. Main part. The stage fate of N.V.’s comedy Gogol "The Inspector General".

II.1. Creative history of the play "The Inspector General".

To understand Gogol’s intention when creating the comedy “The Inspector General,” one should first of all turn to the most important thought formulated by him in his 1847 article “The Author’s Confession”: “I saw that in my writings I laugh for nothing, in vain, without knowing why. If you laugh, it’s better to laugh hard at something that is truly worthy of universal ridicule. In “The Inspector General,” I decided to put together everything bad in Russia that I knew then, all the injustices that are being done in those places and in those cases where justice is most required from a person, and at once laugh at everything. But "This, as you know, had an amazing effect. Through the laughter, which had never before appeared in me with such force, the reader heard sadness. I myself felt that my laughter was not the same as it was before."

The comedy began in October and was completed on December 4, 1835, in less than two months. In the spring of 1836, a separate edition of The Inspector General was published. Gogol repeatedly revised the text. In 1841, the comedy was published in a second edition with some changes. And only in 1842 “The Inspector General” appeared in its final form. In this edition, the text was significantly revised (Khlestakov’s lies were given an inspired hyperbolic character, the final scene was redone, the mayor’s address to the public was inserted: “Why are you laughing? - You’re laughing at yourself!..”, etc.). The text of the latest edition, published in all editions of Gogol, was heard on stage only in 1870.

II. 2. The role of A.S. Pushkin in the creation of N.V. Gogol's comedy "The Inspector General".

A.S. Pushkin played a remarkable role in Gogol’s creation of his famous play “The Inspector General.” N.V. Gogol was fond of theater since childhood (in his childhood, his father, Vasily Afanasyevich, wrote plays, mainly comedies, which were staged in the courtyard theater of their relative, philanthropist Troshchinsky, who lived not far from their Vasilievka estate. N.V. Gogol dreamed of writing it himself comedy and asked A.S. Pushkin to tell him the plot. And Pushkin suggested it - he gave him the plot of the future famous comedy “The Inspector General,” which he kept in his possession. “However,” said the poet, “I could not have written better.” Gogol has an abyss of humor and observation, which are not found in others," writes V. I. Shprok in his “Materials for the biography of Gogol.” A. S. Pushkin was very interested in the fate of the play, the plot of which he presented to Gogol. He was present at the reading of the comedy by the writer He attended the premiere of the play at the Alexandrinsky Theater in St. Petersburg and persuaded Gogol to read the play to the artists of the Moscow Maly Theater.

II. 3. Productions of the play “The Inspector General” in the 19th century.

The play was not immediately cleared for production. Vasily Andreevich Zhukovsky personally had to convince Emperor Nicholas I of the comedy’s trustworthiness.

The premiere of the play in the first edition took place in 1836 at the Alexandrinsky Theater in St. Petersburg. The premiere attracted a full house. The lights were shining brightly in the huge chandeliers, orders and diamonds were shining in the boxes, young people were noisy in the gallery - students, young officials, artists. The king and the heir to the throne sat in the imperial box. The excited author also sneaked into his seat unnoticed.

The performance was a success. The Emperor personally thanked the actors. There is a version that Nicholas I said after watching: “Well, what a play! Everyone got it, and I got it the most.” Since the sovereign liked the play, the comedy was allowed for further productions.

But Gogol was not happy about all this: upset by the shortcomings of the acting, the shortcomings of his own text and the reaction of the audience, who, as it seemed to him, laughed at the wrong thing, he fled from the theater. The painful impressions were aggravated by individual critical reviews that appeared in the press, which Gogol perceived as outright persecution. “Everyone is against me,” he complained to Shchepkin. “Elderly and respectable officials shout that nothing is sacred to me... The police are against me, the merchants are against me, the writers are against me.”

Gogol was disappointed with the production: the actors did not understand the satirical nature of the comedy or were afraid to play as required; the performance turned out to be primitively comic. The main reason for Gogol’s dissatisfaction was not even the farcical nature of the performance, but the fact that with the caricature style of the play, those sitting in the hall perceived what was happening on stage without applying it to themselves, since the characters were exaggeratedly funny. Meanwhile, Gogol’s plan was designed for precisely the opposite perception: to involve the viewer in the performance, to make them feel that the city depicted in the comedy does not exist somewhere far away, but to one degree or another in any place in Russia. Gogol addresses everyone: “Why are you laughing? You’re laughing at yourself!”

The author was also concerned about the lack of costume rehearsals. So, the playwright wanted to see Shchepkin and Ryazansky in the roles of Bobchinsky and Dobchinsky, neat, plump, with decently smoothed hair. At the premiere, the actors appeared on stage with tousled hair, huge shirtfronts pulled out, awkward and unkempt. Actor N.O. Dur presented Khlestakov as a traditional rogue, a vaudeville rogue. Only the mayor performed by I.I. Gogol liked Sosnitsky. Gogol was also upset by the “silent scene”. He wanted the numb facial expressions of the petrified group to hold the audience's attention for two or three minutes until the curtain closed. But the theater did not allow this time for the “silent stage”.

Confused and offended, the writer did not notice that all the leading people in society were trying to get to the performance of “The Inspector General,” and the publication of the text of the play became a real event in the cultural life of Russia. Throughout the 19th century. The play never left the theater stage.

On May 25, 1836, a production of the play was presented at the Maly Theater. In Moscow, the first performance was supposed to take place at the Bolshoi Theater, but under the pretext of repairs, the performance was given the next day at the Maly.where the role of the mayor was played by the famous Russian actorMikhail Semenovich Shchepkin.Gogol joked that Shchepkin in his “The Inspector General” could have played at least ten roles in a row.Despite the absence of the author and the complete indifference of the theater management to the premiere production, the performance was a huge success. However, the magazine “Rumor” described the Moscow premiere as follows: “The play, showered with applause in places, did not excite either a word or a sound when the curtain fell, in contrast to the St. Petersburg production.”

On April 14, 1860, “The Inspector General” was staged by a circle of writers in St. Petersburg in favor of the “Society for Benefiting Needy Writers and Scientists.” This production is especially interesting because it involved not professional actors, but professional writers.Among them were Dostoevsky Fyodor Mikhailovich and Nikolai Alekseevich Nekrasov.

And the interpretation of the images in their performance certainly deserves interest.

There were other productions of the play in the 19th century: at the Polytechnic Exhibition in Moscow (1872), at the Korsh Theater (1882), inMoscow Art Theater. There were also many productions in theaters in different cities of Russia. Some of the premiere productions abroad were in Paris, at the Port-Saint-Martin theater in France, then in Berlin and Prague.

II. 4. Productions of the play “The Inspector General” in the 20th and 21st centuries.

In 1920, the play “The Inspector General” was staged at the Moscow Art Theater (directed by K.S. Stanislavsky). The role of Khlestakov was played by Mikhail Chekhov, a famous dramatic artist, theater teacher, director, nephew of A.P. Chekhov. Contemporaries spoke with delight about this production. In particular, theater critic and playwright A. I. Piotrovsky wrote:
“Chekhov’s Khlestakov is a real artistic feat, this is one of those roles that change the entire performance, break its usual understanding and established traditions. Perhaps for the first time in all those eight decades that the stage history of “The Inspector General” includes, he has finally appeared on the Russian stage! - the Khlestakov about whom Gogol himself wrote..."

In the 20th century, in 1926, one of the most striking and unconventional productions of “The Inspector General” on the Russian stage was offered by the famous innovative directorVsevolod Emilievich Meyerhold. For the performance, he selected actors whose appearance best matched the characters in the play and did not require makeup. Thus, he brought to the stage not just Gogol’s images, but “people from life.” The only place where Meyerhold deviated from the realism of the theatrical image was the “silent” stage: instead of people in it, it was not the actors who appeared before the public, but their life-size dolls, symbolizing the horror of the internal “inhumanity” of Gogol’s characters. The dolls form a “petrified group” - an ironic embodiment of Nicholas Rus', with its Derzhimords and “pig snouts” of bureaucracy and bureaucracy.

The director set himself the artistic task of showing the world of old Russia as a distorting mirror, which reflects its ugliest moments. For example, all scenes with officials were performed on a darkened stage, with candlelight reflected in the mahogany lacquered rear partition with 15 doors. All the female scenes are designed under the bright spotlight, with clearly defined details, exposing the unbridled impulse towards the “flowers of pleasure” that owns the hearts of the selfish ladies and young ladies of the official’s decayed family.

The production of the play “The Inspector General” at the Maly Theater in 1949 was a great success. The role of Khlestakov was played by Igor Ilyinsky. It is noteworthy that the actor was already 48 years old at that time. After three seasons, he will transfer this role to another performer and play the Mayor.

In 1972, at the Leningrad BDT (Bolshoi Drama Theatre), “The Inspector General” was staged by Georgy Aleksandrovich Tovstonogov.

The role of Khlestakov was played by Oleg Basilashvili, the role of the mayor was played by Kirill Lavrov.

On March 26, 1972, the premiere of the play “The Inspector General” took place at the Moscow Theater of Satire, directed by Valentin Pluchek. For ten years the play ran with constant success, not least thanks to the star cast of performers, and entered the golden fund of the Soviet theater. In 1982, for the 10th anniversary, the performance was filmed. The role of Khlestakov is Andrei Mironov, the role of the mayor is Anatoly Papanov. As experts noted, the director looked at Gogol’s textbook play as a modern play denouncing modern society.

According to a theater criticAnatoly Smelyansky , for Valentin Pluchek, turning to Gogol’s comedy became a way of “describing modernity”, an opportunity to talk about the current problems of his time.

Each director of The Inspector General looked for his own ways to present the play. In 2002, at the E. B. Vakhtangov Theater, director Rimas Tuminas presented the following ending to the play: thunder rumbles, rain breaks out, Gogol’s officials find themselves on a raft, and the postmaster is forced to catch up with them on a boat.

In the 21st century, in 2003, a team of actors from Italy under the direction of a famous director surprised the public with an innovative performance based on Gogol’s immortal comedyMatthias Langhoff. Performed by this troupe, The Inspector General turned into a play about the bureaucratic machine, corruption and fear of exposure. As the main scenery, the director used a strange structure consisting of an incredible number of walls, doors, corridors, stairs, nooks and rooms, some of which can rotate around their axis. A meeting of county officials of the 19th century, dressed in 60-70 fashion-X years of the 20th century, resembles a gathering of the Italian mafia. Merchants in good suits and dark glasses talk on mobile phones and write checks to Khlestakov, special signals sound for the escort of executive cars, police officers with brooms enter the hall, the mayor’s wife performs a dance with ribbons, a live dog runs around the stage, and at the end of the play two huge furry dogs appear rats... All these innovations are designed to emphasize the modern sound of the play, its obvious connection with today's life. It is no coincidence that at the press conference the director and actors unanimously asserted that the Russian comedy, depicting a county town in the 19th century, is relevant for today’s Italy. For in Italy, like in many other countries, there are Khlestakovs, and mayors, and, of course, fear of the auditor.

The stage fate of N.V.’s comedy Gogol "The Inspector General"

III. Conclusion.

Nikolai Vasilyevich Gogol saw in the theater a huge educational, transformative force capable of uniting thousands of people and making them “suddenly shake with one shock, burst into tears with one universal laugh.” Neither the theater, nor the public, nor criticism as a whole immediately understood the innovative poetics of the playwright. In the theater of that time, a person was accustomed to feeling, worrying about the heroes of historical dramas, following the deft development of a frivolous vaudeville plot, sympathizing with the characters of a tearful melodrama, being carried away into the worlds of dreams and fantasies, but not reflecting, not comparing, not thinking. Gogol, presenting the requirement for the performance to be based on important social conflicts, to truthfully and deeply reveal the phenomena of life, saturating his works with pain for a person, expected from the viewer involuntary, unexpected laughter generated by the “dazzling brilliance of the mind” and turning to oneself, recognizing oneself in these “heroless” characters. He spoke a different aesthetic language.

The theater contemporary to Gogol had not yet set itself such tasks. Therefore, it is not surprising that the first productions of The Inspector General caused a lot of controversy and mixed responses. The theater did not yet know such drama and did not understand how to play it. The actors, using the techniques of stage existence in vaudeville, tried to make the audience laugh with caricatured grimaces or antics. At the same time, the performances were staged seriously, and wonderful actors were involved in them.

Gogol introduces real life into the theater and explodes the calm, conflict-free consciousness of the audience.

Each era saw N.V. in The Inspector General. Gogol's reflection. How brave the theater people were, so true was the performance: from the vaudeville-farcical St. Petersburg performance in 1836 of the 19th century to the depiction of the modern bureaucratic machine, corruption and fear of exposure in the 21st century.

Gogol saw the meaning of art in serving one’s land, in cleansing oneself from “filth,” and the way to improve society was in the moral self-improvement of the individual: in a demanding attitude towards oneself, in the responsibility of everyone for their behavior in the world. And over time, this desire was seen by both the directors of the comedy “The Inspector General” and the audience of these productions.

Sources and literature.

Application.

A.A. Ivanova. 1841